Under Two Flags eBook

When once more questioned as to his country and his
past by the president, he briefly declined to give
answer. When asked if the names by which he was
enrolled were his own, he replied that they were two
of his baptismal names, which had served his purpose
on entering the army. When asked if he accepted
as true the charge of exciting sedition among the
troops, he replied that it was so little true that,
over and over again, the men would have mutinied if
he had given them a sign, and that he had continually
induced them to submit to discipline sheerly by force
of his own example. When interrogated as to the
cause of the language he had used to his commanding
officer, he said briefly that the language deserved
the strongest censure as for a soldier to his colonel,
but that it was justified as he had used it, which
was as man to man, though he was aware the plea availed
nothing in military law, and was impermissible for
the safety of the service. When it was inquired
of him if he had not repeatedly inveighed against
his commanding officer for severity, he briefly denied
it; no man had ever heard him say a syllable that
could have been construed into complaint; at the same
time, he observed that all the squadrons knew perfectly
well personal enmity and oppression had been shown
him by his chief throughout the whole time of his
association with the regiment. When pressed as
to the cause that he assigned for this, he gave, in
a few comprehensive outlines, the story of the capture
and the deliverance of the Emir’s bride; this
was all that could be elicited from him; and even
this was answered only out of deference to the authority
of the court, and from his unwillingness, even now,
to set a bad example before the men with whom he had
served so long. When it was finally demanded
of him if he had aught to urge in his own extenuation,
he paused a moment, with a gaze under which even the
hard, eagle eyes grew restless, looked across to Chateauroy,
and addressed his antagonist rather than the president.

“Only this: that a tyrant, a liar, and
a traducer cannot wonder if men prefer death to submission
beneath insult. But I am well aware this is no
vindication of my act as a soldier, and I have no desire
to say words which, whatever their truth, might become
hereafter dangerous legacies, and dangerous precedents
to the army.”

That was all which he answered, and neither his counsel
nor his accusers could extort another syllable from
him.

He knew that what he had done was justified to his
own conscience, but he did not seek to dispute that
it was unjustifiable in military law. True, had
all been told, it was possible enough that his judges
would exonerate him morally, even if they condemned
him legally; his act would be seen blameless as a
man’s, even while still punishable as a soldier’s;
but to purchase immunity for himself at the cost of
bringing the fairness of her fame into the coarse
babble of men’s tongues was an alternative,
craven and shameful, which never even once glanced
across his thoughts.